Back behind bars after fracas at unit

A 19-YEAR-OLD Toowoomba man who took part in a violent home invasion just weeks after getting out of jail has been returned to prison.

Benjimin Brett Waters received 12 months' jail and three years' probation in May last year for robbery with violence and assault occasioning bodily harm, Toowoomba Magistrates Court heard.

Released on May 14 this year, having served 12 months, Waters said he became bored and decided to break into a Toowoomba fuel depot on May 30 from which he took 10 fire extinguishers, a quantity of fuel and detergent.

On June 1, Waters went with others to the North Toowoomba unit of a former flatmate of one of his friends who was in dispute with the occupant.

When the complainant answered the door, Waters struck him several times, before using a metal bar to knock a hole in the door when it was shut on him.

A fire extinguisher was then discharged through a pipe put through the hole in the door, which damaged items inside the flat and caused respiratory problems for the complainant, who was later hospitalised.

Because those offences breached his probation, Waters was brought yesterday before Toowoomba District Court, where Judge Grant Britton revoked the order and jailed him for 12 months.

Magistrate Bruce Schemioneck then dealt with Waters in the Magistrates Court, adding a further nine months with a non-parole period of 14 weeks.